


Seabound

by orphan_account



Series: MCU Drabbles [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Heavy Angst, Not A Happy Ending, The Author Regrets Everything, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-09-11
Packaged: 2019-07-11 04:27:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15964700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: STEVE/NATASHAWARNING: This is not a happy story. There is no happy ending. Please don't read if you're not okay with having your heart ripped out and punted across the room. <3





	Seabound

**Author's Note:**

> STEVE/NATASHA
> 
> WARNING: This is not a happy story. There is no happy ending. Please don't read if you're not okay with having your heart ripped out and punted across the room. <3

 

The afternoon sky is flat and dull, heavy with moisture as storm clouds build along the horizon. Silver flashes across the dark blue waves as the ocean crashes to shore. The sharp tang of salt lies heavy on her tongue as she turns away from the window, mixing with the acrid taste of regret.

Her time here is finished.

The year is gone, so quickly.

"Wine, beer, or whiskey?"

The question startles her, but she answers as she has almost every night for the past twelve months.

"Wine. Red, please."

His smile crinkles the skin around his blue eyes, lightening the serious mien he normally wears, as he holds out the glass already poured. Her lover, he is not a man given to wild laughter and gay moods. The joy runs deep, vibrant, and true within in him.

She only hope it runs deep enough to survive what is to come. He’s already been through so much, it hurts her to have to add to his the sadness he carries that rivals the joy in its enormity. He’s lost so much already.

Sipping her wine, she sinks into the wide couch, face resolutely turned from the window. He settles next to her, one hard thigh pressing close, the heat of him seeping through denim to warm them both. Throwing his arm along her shoulders, he flicks on the television and is soon lost in an old movie.

She am lost in him. Never had she thought to have such a gift, even temporarily. 

Watching him as he watches the actors, her throat tightens. Aches.  _ Burns. _ Shining blond locks fall across his brow, messy as they always are. The line of his strong nose, not quite straight, broken in a youthful alley fight, he'd told her. Full lips, sliding into a smile, then a low chuckle. Those lips, the first she'd ever felt upon her own without expectations. She loves their shape, their taste, the way they move against her skin.

Lips that glisten in the low light from the single lamp in their living room as he takes a long swallow from his bottle of beer.

She says his name, once, so softly she wonders if he will hear it over the canned laughter from the television.

But he does, of course, his gaze sliding sideways and colliding with hers. The impact leaves them both breathless. He fumbles with the bottle, attempting to place it on the coffee table without looking, cursing as it falls to the rug.

"Leave it," she signs, the flashing of her fingers strong and sure. She stands, reaching for his hand. He hesitates at the unusual request, knowing her fastidiousness and desire for everything in its proper place. As he glances down at the small puddle of beer soaking into the woven material, she can see questions forming, and she don't want them to, not now, so she tugs on his hand again.

"Leave it be. It will still be there tomorrow. I want you."

And she will not.

She draws him off the couch, tangling their fingers together as he follows willingly at her words. Their footsteps are loud against the wood floor, the sound of the television fading as they make our way down the narrow hall. She keeps her movements light as she seduces him into the big bed they’ve shared since inserted herself into his life. It’s all play, teasing, soft as silk, keeping him focused on her alone as they shed clothes and inhibitions.

If she only has one more night with this man, if this is all they have left, it must be perfect. As perfect as they are in each other's arms. Heat and love, lust and whispered curses that sound like prayers. She’d never laughed with another lover the way she did now with him as they fumbled their way out of their clothes.

He rises above her, moonlight pours in through the open windows to gild his smooth skin as the wind chases wispy clouds across the night sky. And she knows,  _ she knows _ , that she will never forget this man. Her mate. Her one and only, through the eons that stretch before her, echoing and empty.

A year against such a great expanse of time, it hardly seems enough.

Perhaps someday she'll wish she'd never made her bargain with the sea witch. Perhaps the memories will sour, turn brittle with age, bitterness at that which she'd lost running through them until the cracks widen, breaking them into no more than dust.

But in this moment, she doesn’t care. She’ll take what she can, greedily. She’ll take it all and shore up the holes in her soul, fill the cracks inside her, and soothe the sore spots in her heart, with his love.

Her name is a broken whisper on the salt laden wind, torn from his lips as he collapses on top of her, his weight heavy and familiar. She run hands down his back, his muscles shiver and shudder under her touch. Every inch of him is known territory, every bit of bone and muscle and skin she's memorized for a time when she once again drifts in the dark green depths. When she is blind to this world once more, her fingers will still know him in her dreams.

Her beloved.

Soon, too soon, the lingering shivers stop, and he sleeps. Slumber of such depth and sweetness that she hopes he will not wake for the remainder of the night.  _ This _ is when she must leave. Now, while he rests next to her, lips slightly parted, golden hair tangled on the pillow case.

But she cannot. She cannot. She cannot, it is tearing her in two.

She’d never meant to stay this long. Just a glimpse should have been enough.

But there was the storm, his ship breaking into pulp and driftwood. He was so brave, forgoing his own safety to assure the others aboard might have a chance. That night, in between flashes of lightning as the storm tore his boat apart and flung him into the seas, she saw something she'd never seen before. The sheer force of will to live, in which he would not allow the winds to drag him under, nor give in to the siren call of the swelling waves. How easily he could have done, just let slip, but he refused the ocean's embrace. So beautifully human.

She never meant to stay, but once she dragged him to the shore, she could not leave. It was then she sought the sea witch and made her terrible bargain. A voice for a year, a  _ life  _ for a chance at love. She was as bound to him in a matters of hours as she'd ever been to reef and brine.

It would be enough, she'd been so sure, more than enough time. She hadn’t known it could be like this.

She brushed a silken lock off his forehead. A hundred years from now, will her soul still ache like this? The pain is immense. It was measurable, as if she’d mortally wounded. She supposed she had been.

Clouds scudded across the moon, plunging the room into darkness again, and she knew she could delay no longer.

Silent as surf sliding upon sand, she slipped out of bed. Her feet, the same ones that used to betray her in the beginning by constantly tangling and tripping, carry her from the room without a sound. She doesn't bother with clothes. There's no need for them anymore. Her gait is steady as she moves through their home, fingers trailing down the walls, touching photos, keepsakes, memories.

Little mementos of their year together. The life they’d built, so unfairly to him.

She bite her lip hard enough to draw blood, the copper taste of it filling her mouth, but she does not pause as she passes through the front door for the last time. Of course she cannot lock it, because she carries no key tonight, but it doesn't matter. The tiny seaside town they live in is safe, just a sleepy little village tucked into the outermost tip of the bay. Her love will be secure behind his unlocked door, naked and unknowingly alone in their bed.

The only dangerous thing here is her, and she is leaving.

The gravel of their driveway cuts into the tender pads of her feet. Useless, silly feet. But it soon gives way to sand and sea grass, soft and slippery as she walks over the dunes. She struggles for a moment, nearly falling as the sand slides out from under her as if even it conspires to force her to stay, but she manages to claw her way up the largest hillock. The moon breaks free of the clouds again as she reach the top, revealing what she've spent a year steadfastly turning away from. Waves rise and fall, the endless rhythm ancient, the beat of them syncing with the slow thump of her heart.

Water foams and hisses against the beach as the ocean welcomes her home.

Her steps gather speed as she starts down toward the water's edge, until she's half running, as graceless again as she was in those early days. The sea calls to her now, drawing her toward its inevitable embrace, and her thoughts turn to him again. She can almost hear her name on his lips, confusion and pain laced in the questioning. But it's just the wind, she knows, playing its games. He's asleep in their wide bed, in their carefully decorated home, resting on sheets that will still hold her scent come morning.

Her heart fractures as shes step into the surf.

The cold water splashes over her skin, toes going numb. She doesn't mind the pain as the surf swirls around her ankles. As she wades out, the dark tide pulling her along, the water rises and rises and rises. Long strands of her brilliant red hair floats out behind her, twisting and tangling around her chilled limbs like seaweed.

It's almost to her chin when she hear him.

"Nat. Nat! Natasha,  _ don’t _ !"

He's not still safe and asleep in their bed after all, but standing on the shore in only worn jeans, hastily yanked on. Wild eyes, naked pain on his face, one hand stretched out as if he could reach across the waves and pluck her from the ocean by will alone. Perhaps he could. He’d unwittingly done it once already.

A streak of heat sears through her lower half and she knows it’s too late.

He wades into the water, shock crossing his face as he realizes how cold it is. He hates the cold, hates the ocean, but he’s willing to brave it for her. He struggles, thrashing in the water, desperate to get to her, but they hold him fast. She lose sight of him as the heat in in her legs becomes white-hot agony, streaking upward, hotter than lava bubbling out of the ocean's depth. Suddenly, standing is no longer an option.

It takes her under the waves. But she can't go yet. Not yet, not until she know he's safe.

Pushing upward in one powerful thrust, she bursts through the surface with a gasp. Searching the shoreline, she find his crumpled form once again upon the sand, where the ocean spat him back out. Her heart stutters until she see his shoulders heave. Heartbroken at the thought of his losing his lover to the sea, but alive, the way she need him to be.

Humans are resilient. In a handful of years, his pain will dull, will drift away, and he will take another to his bed and into his heart. She wishes this for him so violently she feels that it  _ must  _ come true. If there was another bargain to be made, she’d do it in an instant to secure his wellbeing. This man, her lover, her beloved, deserves the life of joy she cannot give to him. She watches him weep for her, curled into a ball on a moonlight drenched beach, pounding his fists into the glittering sand with rage, and she wishes for him all the things they will not have.

Suddenly pain slices at her neck, agony as her body continues to remake itself. She gasps, clawing at the tender skin. Air fills her mouth, her nose, but she cannot breathe. The pressure is immense, her head feels as though it will split open, light sparking behind her eyes as the briny water closes over her head.

_ Then _ she can breathe again. Not as she had for the last year, but as she had for all the years that came before. Brushing her fingertips against the gills that reformed along the sides of her throat, she wonders if she can still cry, here in the depths of the sea.

She glance down at the glittering scales covering her new, yet familiar body, then turns from the shore, turns away from her beloved for the last time.

She is home.

  
  



End file.
